A Brighter Tomorrow with Electric Cars and AI Games - #8
If you are reading this issue is because... it is finally ready! Happy holiday!
Ciao Readers!
long time no see!
It has been a busy period :) I was in Kos (Greece) for some days, and then in Syracuse (Italy) at the beginning of June.
If you like classics, tragedies or comedies, you definitely must go to Syracuse during summer time. Every summer you can attend performances at the open-air Greek Theater (see the image below; and yes. The image is real): modern representation of Greek tragedies or comedies.
This was the second time for me and it’s always amazing. The tragedies are always gripping: it is impossible to get bored when it comes to betrayal, sex and revenge.
And if you want a taste of what you might see, this is a minute of Sophocles' Oedipus Rex, staged in that theater:
But… yes. This should not be a newsletter about theater or classics, so… let’s start; and, for your information, this won’t be a full IT number. It’ll be just a (very) interesting collection of readings and videos ;)
Something to read
Elon Musk and his eclecticism is on everyone's lips nowadays. I would have an easy time talking about twitter (or X) but I won't: material for other editions.
Today I want to share with you some interesting and somewhat critical articles about Tesla, its policies and its market.
As a disclaimer I can say that electric cars, their sustainability and forward thinking, are one of the topics I am most passionate about lately. Read more about it later in this issue.
In this article from Reuters Tesla has been accused of intentionally inflating the range estimates of its electric vehicles. The company created a "Diversion Team" in Las Vegas to cancel as many range-related service appointments as possible. This was done because Tesla's service centers were inundated with appointments from owners who had expected better performance based on the company's advertised estimates and the projections displayed by the in-dash range meters of the cars themselves.
Tesla's range estimates are often inaccurate. In some cases, Tesla vehicles have been found to fall short of their advertised ranges by as much as 26%. The company has been fined by South Korean regulators for exaggerating the distance its vehicles can travel before their batteries run out. The EPA has also required Tesla to reduce the range estimates it wanted to advertise for some of its vehicles.
Read it here: https://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/tesla-batteries-range
Something to read, 2
(Image: Steve Jurvetson, CC BY 2.0, modified by pluralistic)
This is a bigger article about the very same topic: Tesla, Musk and his lies.
The article, published by Pluralistic, is full of links based on interviews with former Tesla employees, internal company documents, and government reports. A very critical and polemical piece about Musk's activities and methods.
Once you start unpacking Tesla's balance sheets, you start to realize how much the company depends on government subsidies and tax-breaks, combined with selling carbon credits that make huge, planet-destroying SUVs possible, under the pretense that this is somehow good for the environment.
Read it: Tesla's Dieselgate
Something to read, 3
As said before, the electric car and the whole ecosystem around it is a topic of great interest to me; a necessary transition. We cannot burn non-renewable resources lifelong. It is already too late.
The piece I’m sharing here is truly enlightening and it is a must read for all those who want to understand how sustainable electric cars really are, how they can be, and whether it makes sense to continue along the road of research on these new technical jewels. This article was published by Popular Science, it looks at the emissions produced by electric cars throughout their lifecycle, from the mining of the raw materials to the disposal of the batteries.
Here are some of the interesting points from the article:
The emissions produced during the manufacturing of electric cars are lower than those produced during the manufacturing of gasoline cars.
The emissions produced during the disposal of electric car batteries can be significant, but they are still lower than the emissions produced during the disposal of gasoline car engines.
I encourage you to read the article and learn more about the environmental impact of electric cars - Electric cars are better for the environment, no matter the power source
Something to watch
Let's go back to the original title of the newsletter ;), and talk about IT - specifically security.
The playlist you can find linked here (above, the trailer) is called "HACKING GOOGLE", it is hosted by Google on YouTube. The playlist consists of videos that tell the stories of 5 elite security teams at Google. The teams are responsible for keeping Google's users safe online.
The playlist is a great resource for anyone who wants to learn more about how Google protects its users from online threats. The videos are well-made and informative, and they provide a behind-the-scenes look at the work of Google's security teams.
You can find the playlist here! And this is the first video:
Something to try
Let’s stick with IT security: pwn.college is an online education platform for students (and other interested parties) to learn about, and practice, core cybersecurity concepts in a hands-on fashion. The platform is designed to take a "white belt" in cybersecurity to becoming a "blue belt", able to approach (simple) CTFs and wargames.
pwn.college is a great resource for anyone who is interested in learning about cybersecurity. The platform is well-designed and easy to use, and the exercises are challenging but rewarding. If you are willing to learn cybersecurity, then pwn.college is a great starting point.
The platform was created by Zardus (Yan Shoshitaishvili) and kanak (Connor Nelson) at Arizona State University.
The platform is open source, so anyone can contribute to its development.
If you are interested in learning more about pwn.college, you can visit the website here: https://pwn.college/
Something to try, 2
Gandalf is a security challenge-game created by Lakera, a company that specializes in cybersecurity. The challenge is designed to test the ability of large language models (LLMs) to resist prompt attacks.
In a prompt injection attack, an attacker tries to trick an LLM into revealing sensitive information by providing it with a carefully crafted prompt. For example, an attacker might provide the LLM with a prompt that asks for the password to a secure account. If the LLM is not properly trained, it may be tricked into revealing the password.
Gandalf is designed to be a very difficult prompt injection challenge. The LLMs used in the challenge are trained on a massive dataset of text and code. This means that they are very good at understanding and responding to natural language prompts. However, the LLMs are also trained to be defensive. They are designed to resist attempts to trick them into revealing sensitive information.
The Gandalf challenge has been successful in demonstrating the vulnerabilities of LLMs to prompt injection attacks. However, it has also shown that it is possible to train LLMs to be more resistant to these attacks.
Apart from the technical side, the game in my opinion is fun and anyone can play it, even those who are reading this newsletter without any interest in IT!
Something to try, 3
This resource I share now is a LinkedIn post from Dr. Milan Milanović: it is not an article, it is not a video, it is not a software... it is a methodology. And it is the methodology I use during my daily work: I divide tasks into urgent, non-urgent, important, unimportant - the Eisenhower matrix. This division automatically gives the tasks a priority and an assignment (e.g. the urgent unimportant can be delegated!).
Do you use any specific methodology like this one?
Read about it here: Urgent is not the same as important!
Milanović also publishes a (much more interesting ;) ) tech-related newsletter you can subscribe to here:
Something to… bonus!
Have you ever been to the null island?! Null Island Is One of the Most Visited Places on Earth. Too Bad It Doesn’t Exist!
Null Island is a fictional island located at 0°0′N 0°0′W, the intersection of the Equator and the Prime Meridian. It is a "non-place" that exists only in the minds of computers and maps.
Null Island is one of the most visited places on Earth, because it is the default location for geocoding errors. When a computer is unable to find a specific location, it often defaults to Null Island. This means that Null Island is often visited by people who are looking for places that do not exist.
Null Island has become a bit of a meme in the GIS community. There are even t-shirts and mugs with the Null Island logo.
The article here also discusses the history of Null Island and how it came to be. It also discusses the implications of Null Island for the way we think about geography and maps. The name "Null Island" was coined by a group of GIS professionals in the early 2000s and is not the only non-place that exists in the world. There are many other "phantom islands" that are the result of geocoding errors.
Well, you definitely have to go there!
Thank you for reading my newsletter! I appreciate your support and I look forward to bringing you more tech news and updates in the future.
In the meantime: a very happy summer, everyone! I hope you're all enjoying the warm weather and taking some time to relax. If you're not on vacation, I hope you're able to find some time to enjoy the outdoors or catch up on your favorite books and links and courses and newsletters :D
Stay cool and have fun!
Ciao!
David